Silent Planet blew so many people away with their debut album, The Night God Slept, and for good reason. That album is a masterpiece through and through. They have quickly gathered a reputation as a band that creates some of the most thought-provoking music, both via ambient melodies that tap into the emotions and thought process, as well as via eloquently-crafted lyrics that talk about some of the toughest questions and debates of our time.

Everything In Slow Motion is a project whose name fits its sound, in my book. It's the solo project by Shane Ochsner, former vocalist and guitarist of post-metal band Hands. Combining rock and metalcore with atmospheric, post-rock ambiance, this is a project that I've recently come across after discovering Ochsner's previous band, and they've been a great opening to a genre that I've begun to explore and deeply enjoy which has led me to bands like their labelmates, A Hope for Home or Your Memorial.

One particular phrase has essentially been my life's motto for the past two years or so: "I believe, help my unbelief." I began hearing that phrase in my head many times particularly in 2015, as I continued to struggle and fight emotional disconnections and even doubt. It was in mid-2015 that "progressive ministry metal" band, Mouth of the South announced that they were rebranding as Rival Choir and releasing a new album in early 2016. The title of that album? "I Believe, Help My Unbelief".

Phinehas is a band that really stands out among their peers in a genre that tends to lean towards staleness. Metalcore has, for several years, been getting more and more stale, with many bands sounding like each other, to the point where it is sometimes hard to distinguish which bands are which. Ever since their incredible 2011 debut, Thegodmachine -- an instant masterpiece of the genre, up there with Killswitch Engage's Alive or Just Breathing -- Phinehas has been showing the world how good metalcore can be if the bands would write each song as if they were creating a masterpiece of art. Complex guitar and bass work, beautifully encouraging (and sometimes brutally honest) Christian lyrics, thunderous drumming, and incredibly dynamic vocals are always the centerpiece of this band's efforts.

I'd like to state in advance that this post may come across as angry, hateful, or downright immature in some spots, but that's not my intention. I am angry, but I do not hate the groups or people I'm about to talk about. I am simply frustrated and disappointed that mob rule has, once again, won over something that I really loved. This is just my way of venting.

A while back on my Twitter, I mentioned that I'd like to write a blog post on how game devs, or any company for that matter, can learn to balance profit and integrity. Well, today I've finally decided to sit down and write on this topic. It may be lacking in quality, but my mind is running in a million different directions at once.

I feel like a major problem in the Body of Believers these days is the fact that they tend to let the world get them down. They tend to say, in essence, "Why try swimming against an impossible tide?". Or, in the case of a psychotic person, "Society has tried its best at raising, and even changing this person. It apparently failed, so why keep trying?". Or worse still, "Society has tried, time and time again, to try to create something good, yet it always fails. So why try to succeed when so many others have failed?"

"Next-gen" is a common word these days in the games industry. Everyone claims their new games are 'next-gen' games. Companies have turned it from being a term describing a truly new gaming experience, into a cheap marketing ploy. So what does it mean to truly be a next-gen game? The motto of Yokaan Games Studio is "Building a Next-Gen Revolution", so perhaps I can describe what I personally feel a next-gen game should be.

Note: this is a blog post I wrote on my My Opera blog before they shut the service down, so this is somewhat dated. I wrote it around November or December of 2013. I decided to port it to my new blog because it isn't public on the internet anywhere right now.